


A Not So Small Life

by esteefee



Category: Stargate Atlantis
Genre: Character Study, Gen, SGA Saturday Prompt Challenge
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-07-25
Updated: 2011-07-25
Packaged: 2017-10-21 18:26:44
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 416
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/228250
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/esteefee/pseuds/esteefee
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>John always figured he'd have a pretty ordinary life.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Not So Small Life

John always figured he'd live a small life; run-of-the-mill, pretty ordinary. He wasn't like Rodney with the big brained theories and the even bigger dreams of Nobels and being remembered for his work generations down the line.

John's father hadn't wanted it that way, but then, he and his dad hadn't seen eye to eye on a lot things and that was the biggest one, the one that tied it all up in a big knot.

John wanted to fly; that was it. He wanted to see things, but not be seen. He picked some pretty good camouflage, buddies like Ray, Little Moe, Mitch, Dex, Holland—guys that were bigger than big, the loudest guys in the room, and John provided the beer, the set-up, and sometimes, occasionally, the punch-line.

When John was good, he was really good—in the sky, no one could touch him. Fixed wings, helos—you name it, he could fly it.

But he had no ambitions on the ground, and his C.O.s all knew it. Nothing to see here. Move along.

Until he sat in that weird chair.

Until Atlantis.

John could blame a lot of things, if blame was the word he was looking for, late at night when he couldn't sleep for the pressure, for the walls closing in, the people he was responsible for, the deaths on his shoulders, the whole fucking galaxy he now had to defend. He could blame Sumner for getting caught, or O'Neill for sending him here to begin with; he could blame Rodney or Elizabeth for looking to him all the time as if he were The Guy, John Wayne with a P-90.

He could blame the gene that got him into this, that twist of code, of fate. One in a million or a billion, rare as the Star of India.

But John thought it was Atlantis herself, and the fact she could fly. A city that could fly—John thought, how could he fight that? Because even grounded, she was under his hands, bird-light and heavy as stone.

No place for him to hide.

John always figured he would live a pretty small life. That hadn't proven to be true.

If he was real lucky, though, maybe he'd survive long enough to die an ordinary death. An old man slipping in the bathtub at the age of eighty.

It was something to look forward to anyway, in between the crazy shit.

So John just smiled and kept on flying.


End file.
